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Category Archives: Vegan Shopping

One of my favourite stores to shop at is The Source Bulk Foods in Brunswick, currently the biggest specialised bulk food retailer in Australia. The Source has many outlets around town and also around the country. They are a plastic bag and packaging free store and encourage customers to bring in their own containers.

The products are in storage units you access yourself. If, for example, you’re not using your own container for dry goods, you take a paper bag and fill it with your item. Each item has a number code written on the label, so you write this code on your paper bag and the staff weigh the bag at the register, plugging in the code. Easy!

Not all of the products are vegan but everything has a label on it indicating vegan (or not) status. Not all items though, for instance I buy the Australian smoked almonds which are vegan but not labelled as such. I’m using that as an example because although you may think smoked almonds are vegan, some of them sold in packets in stores and supermarkets contain milk powder.

There are also liquid products like syrups, oils, vinegars and more. Again, you can take in your own bottle or you can purchase one in store. There are bottles available for things like tamari or you can buy glass jars that can store the tahini.

For spices, spice containers are available to purchase (though I just use a paper bag). The spices are up on a higher shelf and you use a little scoop to measure them out.

I often buy my flours from The Source such as spelt and buckwheat. I’ve seen teff, bakers flour, gluten free flour, banana flour and much more. There are some pasta varieties like buckwheat. There are legumes and pulses, grains and seeds, nuts and nut meals. Sugars and cacao too.

There are dried fruits, muesli blends and of lots of chocolate. I love the dried veggie chips and puffy almond crackers. You can also make fresh peanut butter or buy some pre-made.

And of course, my kitchen staple: nutritional yeast! I received confirmation that the nooch sold here is B12 fortified.

As well as your kitchen needs, there are bathroom and cleaning products available in bulk like shampoo you can put in to your own bottle.

We’re making more of a firm effort here at home to cut down on our use of plastics and packaging. It’s great to be able to go in to a store where you are encouraged to bring your own containers and I’m pleased now that other shops I go to, like the bakery, are happy to have your bring in your own bags. Some aren’t on board of course, but stores like The Source are setting a standard I hope others try to achieve. I know I am plennnnty guilty of having bought those big plastic bags of bulk beans and lentils in the past, then they get forgotten in the pantry and by the time I remember them, they’re way past their best before date. With meal planning for the family now, and trying to cut down on food wastage and unnecessary packaging, The Source is handy because I buy just what I need and don’t have to worry about the packaging.

I’ve visited the Prahran store as well as Brunswick and the staff have always been friendly and helpful. The Brunswick store owners are opening a second store in Moonee Ponds too.

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Hurrah for the Coburg Farmers Market now being held weekly! Previously I’d be waking up on a Saturday planning to go then realising it wasn’t on that day. Then I’d forget to go the following week. And so on and so on. I last blogged about my visit to the market back in mid 2014 so it was time for an update.

The stalls do seem to change a little as I went a couple of weeks ago and some stalls were not there today (or some stalls today weren’t there last time). Today was ace market weather though, one of those perfect windy autumn days.

As this is a vegan blog, I’m only showing the stalls that would appeal to vegan shoppers or people wanting plant based products. Being a farmers market there are of course non-vegan stalls but yep, it’s all a-vegan here in Veganopoulous town!

Sprouts, salad mix, grasses at Urban Caterpillar Microgreens. I was very tempted by the mustard and buckwheat salad mix but went for the pea shoots instead. These are all grown in Newport, a suburb not too far from the Melbourne CBD (it’s the suburb next door to Williamstown):

I was glad to see Three Bridges Apples were back. Beautiful juicy apples, not like the tasteless chalky balls of disappointment I’ve bought from the supermarket recently. I’m assuming these are grown in Three Bridges, which is about a one hour and forty-five minute drive east of Melbourne:

I also picked up some chestnuts. Now I can live my dream and play conkers! Whatever the hell that is, all I know is that it involves strings and kids saying “I say!” a lot. Enid Blyton story kids played conkers. And seemed to spend a lot of time walking over stiles:

Apple Cider from Snakes & Ladders. I haven’t tried it yet but will next time. The fruit is all grown, mashed, fermented and bottled in the Goulburn Valley region:

Mandarines from, I think, Doron Talmi Citrus though the fellow working on the stall mentioned the business name is Sweetease(?). They also sell freshly squeezed orange juice, including blood orange. The fruit is grown in Colignan, just south of Mildura:

Some really nice balsamic vinegar and sauces from Sticky Balsamic. The fig is really nice (I ended up buying it). The salted caramel coconut is vegan too and used as a dessert sauce. All produced in Geelong:

Fresh berries, syrups and jams from Kookaberry Farm in Wandin. The Kookaberry Farm website lists an impressive number of medal placings for their products:

Weyhill Farm Garlic. These looked beautiful in the sun! All grown in the hills of South Gippsland. On their About page on their website, Weyhill’s owners say “we fell in love with the place on after taking a wrong turn on a weekend drive”– love it!

Olives and olive oil from Lisadurne Hill. The Hojiblanca contains honey according to the website (I just checked it now), at the time I took the photo I was assuming it was oil without non-vegan products so vegans, please keep that in mind as there are samples on the table for tastings. The olives are brine cured:

2 & 5’s website says “we are a social enterprise set up to address food insecurity in the Northern Suburbs of Geelong by improving access to affordable, sustainable, fresh and healthy food. This is achieved by providing high-quality fresh produce through production and retail. Corio and Norlane are seen as areas of socio-economic disadvantage and the residents have been identified as being at risk of food insecurity in research done by the State Government Neighbourhood Renewal Project. We believe that by making fresh fruit and vegetables more accessible, food security can be dramatically improved.” Great stuff! We have quite a few jars of this jam at home, as well as the tomato relish and today I added the green bean mustard pickle to my collection. 2 & 5 also sell vegetables:

Update: I don’t know why my pictures of Flinders Sourdough didn’t make it here and I didn’t notice I’d left them out when my post was published! Here are the vegan loaves, the buns weren’t vegan but all these were. I bought a loaf of the fig sourdough:

Beautiful herbs and produce on display at MKD Services:

Peninsula Fresh Organics had loads of brightly coloured veggies (the carrots in the top photo are from their stall). All certified organic and grown in Baxter on the Mornington Peninsula:

I hope I have all the photos correct, I have a sneaking suspicion I have mixed up some of the stall holder names.

Coburg Farmers Market is held on Saturday from 8am to 1pm at Coburg North Primary School. Entry is by gold coin donation. There’s ample parking around the side streets or you can catch the 527 bus which stops right outside the school. Bell Street is a short-ish walk away so the market is also accessible via the 903 bus, 513 bus and 55 West Coburg tram.

WEEAC in Melbourne is an annual event that raises awareness of the suffering animals endure every day. Events are held worldwide and yesterday Melbourne held its WEEAC gathering at CERES Community Environment Park in Brunswick. There were stalls, speakers, music and of course lots of food with perfect weather to top it off!

I didn’t stay for the whole day so there aren’t any pics of the evening fun (bonfire!). It was a great family friendly event with dogs (on leashes) allowed. I got some nice big canine smiles too and you may spot your best buddies here!

I hope you enjoy this look at Melbourne’s WEEAC for 2015. Many thanks to all involved with putting on the event and a special thanks to stall holders at the activism and rescue stalls– so many people doing such amazing work here and around the world. Atrocities against animals take place every minute of every day, but we have the power to choose kindness and to show compassion.

I got to try the new vegan souvlaki by Vegan Pop-Ups. It’s as good as it looks in the photos (top and middle left)! Also shown below is the crispy noodle salad from Jerry’s Vegiburgers and on the bottom left is Chili Express:

I love Dosa Joy and stand there like a food nerd watching them make dosa; hot weather meant I got to cool off with 100% fruit sorbet from Smooth As Fruit; Simply Vegan Cuisine with Dolly the bus serving up their tasty vegan meals:

Serious face bit: You are welcome to use my photos but please provide credit and link back to my blog. Thank you! Aaaand snap back to happy face with jazz hands because this is a happy post!

World Vegan Day Melbourne! The number one event on many a vegan’s calendar here. We had the added fortune of the nearby train line being opened for the event which was pretty big– a good sign of the times changing I say!

There were new food stalls, some launching on the day and old favourites too. This year’s WVD also had a dedicated Fitness Zone and fashion show which were pretty exciting– I love seeing how WVD grows every year! There was an art exhibition, kids space and rides, food demonstrations, presentations, music and entertainment, speed dating, not-for-profit stalls and of course products/services stalls.

Because this is really photo heavy, I won’t include a lot of text. I’ll let the pictures do the talking wherever possible!

It was impossible to photograph everything and I do apologise to those I’ve left out. There were also photos that didn’t turn out well (or I couldn’t crop out unfortunate facial expressions– as someone who is always snapped in the background of photos with a severe constipated look and often accompanying body position, I will look out for you) It was pretty tricky running from one spot to another to take pics, especially when there were stalls, people and scheduled events I wanted to check out.

Please leave a comment below (I don’t have to publish it if you prefer, just mention it in the comment) or contact me on faye[at]veganopoulous[dot][com] if there is anything you would like to bring to my attention about the photos!

I had a fabulous time and really enjoyed the sense of community. Thank you to the WVD crew for allowing me to go in early and for all your work setting up the event! And a big thank you to everyone involved with stalls, demos, presentations, volunteering, everything!

I hope you enjoy this look at World Vegan Day in Melbourne, 2015. Please feel free to share this blog post on social media– Melbourne’s World Vegan Day is a winner and I’d love the world to see how we do it here 😀

Woking Amazing (top three photos, below) had their launch at WVD. I’ve been waiting to try a vegan dim sim for 3.5 years now (i.e. the time I’ve been vegan). I finally got my wish and am happy to advise that you go stuff your face with these. They were excellent. Also shown are the beautifully colourful Vegilicious grilled meals (this grill smelled sooo good); self-serve chili sauce on top of your meal from Fina’s 2 Vegan Restaurant in Fitzroy; mixed plate by Dosa Joy; serving up wraps and fries at Soy Division:

We have so much creative talent here in Melbourne when it comes to vegan food and baking is certainly no exception! Von’s Vegan Bake House had so many wonderful treats today like a baklava cake (top left and bottom right, below); black sesame matcha layer cake with white chocolate frosting (top right); coconut sponge with caramel frosting:

The Compassionate Kitchen‘s cakes and slices are a favourite with my family. Today I finally got to try their raw ferrero cake, shown below with their iced tea (which came in super handy because it got pretty stuffy in the pavillion at some points). Delicious as always! Their banana bread is ace too:

Check out the hours of work that have gone in to these creations by Oh My Vegan Bakery. Just beautifully done:

Monika from Vegan Cakes By Monika had what I think would have been the most awesome WVD job: making cakes for the kids zone! Here’s one of her sweet creations. Photo credit to Chris Thomas:

The Decadent Desserts Company make my favourite fudge (as in, I buy some for others but ending up eating it on the tram ride home). You can also find them at market stalls such as the Queen Vic; Half Pint Vegan Dairy launched some new fab flavours at WVD and I’m looking forward to trying them:

Ice cream and more good food! More evidence we are pretty spoiled here in Melbourne. Below we have Zebra Dream Ice Cream (I still can’t work out which is my favourite flavour); apple cider and iced teas from Those Girls; fresh flavoured popcorn from Organic Popcorn; your icecream reward from ever-popular Fritz Gelato after queuing a while:

More creative talent on display with gorgeous hand made jewellery and accessories! Shown below are Project Triceratops; reincarting rubbish with WozWaste; earrings and sweet animal figures sold by Futuro Vega*Pop; jewellery, wallets, bags and more at Jubly-Umph:

Vegan body building legends! Billy Simmonds of Prana ON gave a great presentation on veganism in the mainstream. He was also loudly cheered on by a large crowd during his fitness challenge! Robert Cheeke was part of the Vegan Transformations Panel and could also be found at his stall with vegan apparel and his fantastic book Shred It!

I only caught the last bit of JAIID‘s set– there was so much going on at WVD!

I’ll finish up with a bunch of images with scenes of World Vegan Day.

COOL BAGS AND STUFF

And I’ll finish with awarding The Inaugural Veganopoulous Best Item Of Clothing Award to the person shown below in the mega brilliant watermelon top. There’s no prize, and I didn’t actually plan on such a contest until I saw this top but it’s so cool that first place was awarded instantly and no correspondence was entered in to, my relatives were not eligible to enter, etc etc:

I hope you enjoyed this look back at Melbourne’s World Vegan Day for 2015. If you’re not from Melbourne, come and visit during this time of year 😀

One thing I love about being a vegan food blogger is discovering vegan products and sharing them with readers. I know many of you are fans of chocolate (ha!) and so I’m very happy to write about Nestar and Miss Sweetie as well as giving you a chance to win some of their goodies. For details of how to enter, please read on!

Founded by Elizabeth Simaliak and Issy Bilal, Nestar and Miss Sweetie are based here in Melbourne. Issy is Nestar’s chocolatier and he has trained in both Europe and Australia. Issy carefully selects the chocolate coatings to best compliment a given flavour and centre to produce top quality hand panned chocolates and he uses one hundred year old hand hammered copper pans, keeping true to traditional chocolate making methods. With a background as an Art Director, Elizabeth has created all
the brand concepts and the brand designs. Elizabeth’s Miss Sweetie range is fully vegan with many fruit based flavours.

All of Nestar’s manufacturing, from making their chocolates to printing the packaging, is done locally. Wherever possible, Issy and Elizabeth source Australian produce such as fresh Buderim ginger and Queensland macadamia nuts.

Everything I’ve tried from both Nestar and Miss Sweetie has been delicious and are on my list for gift ideas (to me and from me)! The chocolate coated macadamias have been really popular with my family and friends and I had to fight the family for the chocolate coated goji:

Gosh it was hard photographing these without eating them. Okay, maybe I did eat some of the props. I also tried not to squish the chocolates too much when cutting them open for you to get a look at the insides. Included are photos of the packaging so you know what to look for!

Hazelnut and chocolate is one of my top favourite combinations. I loved these whole hazelnuts surrounded in a nice fat layer of pure Belgian style dark chocolate:

Coconut and chocolate is another favourite combination, so I loved the Miss Sweetie Yum Fruits dark chocolate covered coconut pieces. There’s a nice cube of coconut in the middle and a lovely coconutty taste:

More handmade goodness in the form of goji berries covered in dark chocolate! I was eating these like popcorn (no, not one piece at a time… I’m talking more the emptying a handful in your mouth thing. Gotta get those antioxidants in!):

The Miss Sweetie Yum Fruits cranberry chocolates were a favourite with the family. Pre-vegan, I used to like chocolate covered sultanas but these are my new favourite:

The Miss Sweetie Yum Fruits dark chocolate mango was a nice surprise. I usually don’t like fruit filled chocolate and didn’t know what to expect but these were really good. There was no overpowering fruity taste, which I’ve experienced in the past with other fruit filled chocolate. These were just right:

You can keep up to date with Nestar and Miss Sweetie on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/nestarsweetie Please go and give them a like! They often run giveaways and provide discount codes for their awesome products so it’s well worth following! You can also follow on Instagram at @nestarmisssweetie.

* This giveaway is now closed, thanks for entering! *

Giveaway time! This giveaway is for readers with an Australian mailing address.

Nestar and Miss Sweetie will send one winner four vegan chocolate packets of choice from the Nestar and Miss Sweetie vegan chocolates range. Head on over to http://www.nestar.com.au/onlineshop/vegan and leave a comment below letting me know what flavours sound great to you. This giveaway runs for two weeks and ends on October 9th 2015 at 23:59pm. The winner will be chosen by a random number generator. Please feel free to share on social media! Good luck!

Disclaimer: Nestar and Miss Sweetie sent me the above products to sample and review. All opinions are my own and I only recommend products I really like!

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Welcome!

Hello and welcome! I'm Faye and I blog about vegan life here in Melbourne, Australia. I love connecting readers with news of events, dining options, products, services and anything else that can help people already living, or those considering switching to a more plant based lifestyle. Family, my Greek roots, secondhand shopping and my home town are also a focus on my blog.